Abbas Kiarostami

Abbas Kiarostami was born in Tehran in 1940. He studied at Tehran University’s Faculty of Fine Arts majoring in painting and graphic design. In 1969, he established the filmmaking division for the government-run Institute for the Intellectual Development of Children and Young Adults (Kanoon). Between 1970–2016 Kiarostami made over sixty features and short films. He primarily worked in Iran but toward the end of his career, in Italy (Certified Copy, 2010) and Japan (Like Someone in Love, 2012). Alongside his work as a director, Abbas Kiarostami was a published poet, painter, and photographer. He taught filmmaking and collaborated with many in the Iranian industry, writing scripts for Jafar Panahi’s The White Balloon (1995) and Crimson Gold (2003). His final film, 24 Frames, was posthumously completed and premiered at the Cannes Film Festival in 2017.

Source: Kristy Matheson, May 2022